MeFight Club Muxtape

I’ve been spending some time with a bunch of awesome internet gaming friends over at MeFight Club, which is a gaming offshoot of Metafilter. One of the MeFighters had the outstanding idea for everyone to make mixtapes for others to listen to, using software similar to the dear departed Muxtape. Like last time I made a music mix, I figured that I should get some additional benefit of my work, so I decided to post it here. The mix I made this time was basically “stuff I like or that fits my mood right now”, but each track also had to have a nice-sounding transition from one to the next.

Below is a flash interface for listening to all the music on the muxtape. I’m not linking directly to the mp3 files themselves. (Although you can find them easily if you know where to look…)

Some explanations of why I included these specific songs:

Pocket Novel Mystery – Her Favorite Records

A song that I found off MeFi Music ages ago, and really liked. It’s been in my “sad mood” rotation since. The lyrics are just so bleak and depressing, makes me feel better about myself in a way.

Faye Wong – Emotional Life

When we went to China, we quickly found that Chinese pop was pretty much the sappiest music you have ever heard – it’s a LOT of what I would call bubblegum pop. We bought a stack of CD:s at a market in Hong Kong (I think it was 24 CD:s for about 5 dollars), and it was ALL pretty terrible. I was giving up on finding anything good when I found this album. It was like finding the one red rose in a sea of black and white (a la Pleasantville).

I have a soft spot for this for a similar reason. This was a project by Joakim Berg from Kent and Peter Svensson from the Cardigans, and was pretty much only released in Sweden. I had heard one of their covers before, but never knew that they actually had an album. When we found this album at a used record place in Virginia Beach I knew I had to have it. And it turns out that there are some good songs on there, even. The lyrics are very complex in Swedish, lots of phrases that could be interpreted several ways. Ok, I’ll link this one, as the lyrics – along with an English translation – are embedded in the mp3.

Lisa Hannigan – Last Leaf

I bought “The Cake Sale” for the Ride cover, but I think this is one of the best tracks on the album.

Kurt Nilsen, Espen Lind, Askil Holm & Alejandro Fuentes – Hallelujah

Great song. And I just really like their interpretation, as it’s more fun with more than one voice.

Jose Gonzalez – Cycling Trivialities

Pretty mainstream, I guess. I like the guitar work here the most. My sister in law made a mix CD for my husband, and it contained a lot of good songs, including this one.

Coco Lee – Di Da Di

The title refers to the sound a clock makes – “tick tock” basically. This song was everywhere in Taiwan – on the radio, being played in taxis, being played in stores, on the street, in the night market… It stuck in my head and has been there since.

Aberdeen City – God Is Going To Get Sick Of Me

A Pandora find. I really really like this whole album “The Freezing Atlantic” too.

You Say France & I Whistle – When lovers die

Sveriges Radio, the National Swedish Radio, is pretty progressive when it comes to offering stuff on the web. I listen to the program called “P3 Svea”, which plays new Swedish music. [They also have several other themed stations, including P3 Street with immigrant hip hop, P3 Star for mainstream hits, etc.] At the P3 Svea page, click on the icon that says “P3 Svea Direkt” to listen. They have a feature called “P3 Lab”, which plays unsigned/about to be signed bands. This is one of their most played there, but I had to hunt for days to find an mp3 of it.

Raymond & Maria – Ingen vill veta

In Sweden you occasionally get songs that bleed out into every type of radio program and into every demographic, often during the summer when a lot of people listen to the radio. They are generally called “Landsplågor”, which translates to “Country Tormentors”. When I was home a few years ago, this song was the tormentor of the year. It’s especially interesting because the lyrics don’t fit at ALL with the upbeat and peppy music.

The Ordinary Boys – Just a Song

It’s in that context that I included this one as a followup. It also reminds me of Hard Fi, which is one of my favorite bands.

Muse – Man of Mystery

Really just a transition to the next song. But Muse is my favorite band, so I thought I would use one of their fun covers for it, as it fit.